Yves is a Brussels-qualified international trade, customs, and EU regulatory lawyer. He concentrates on trade remedy investigations, customs compliance and investigations, export controls and sanctions, conflict minerals and other import controls, World Trade Organization dispute settlements, and data protection. Chambers Global market sources value Yves' ability to "make the inexplicable seem explicable," and praise him for "speedy responses, integrity, and flexibility."
Yves has represented clients before the EU Courts in more than 20 disputes relating to international trade and customs laws, including in the landmark cases Ikea Wholesale (Case C-351/04) and XinYi PV (Case T-586/14). Client comments featured in Chambers Global state that Yves "often thinks outside the box and achieves great success."
In the past 18 years, he has represented companies in more than 100 trade remedy proceedings (anti-dumping measures, countervailing measures, and safeguards) across a wide range of industries. Chambers Global commentators state that they are "very impressed" with his advice regarding anti-dumping issues, noting that "Yves Melin is especially experienced in the field of trade remedies and customs law." Legal 500 writes that he is "energetic, responsive, knowledgeable, and friendly."
In the customs area, Yves helps clients reduce duty exposure through customs compliance programs, customs duty suspension filings, and customs litigation. Chambers Global 2020 note that Yves has “notable experience in the co-ordination of customs recovery actions across multiple EU member states”. Yves is also one of the founders of Greenlane, an alliance of European customs and international trade law firms. Greenlane consists of 55 trade and customs lawyers located throughout Europe, as well as in Brazil, China, India and Taiwan. Yves acts as Greenlane's pivotal EU and WTO law contact.
He also advises companies on data protection compliance and the interaction between export control rules and data protection law. He holds the CIPP/E certification as a Certified Information Privacy Professional from the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP).
Yves is member of the editorial board of the Global Trade and Customs Journal where he publishes frequently, he lectures on trade and customs matters at the European Law Academy (ERA) in Trier, and he is a member of the steering committee of the Trade & Customs Law Academy of the University of Liège in Belgium.
